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FinTech & Blockchain Forum Auckland| Events in Auckland-New Zealand

FinTech & Blockchain Forum Auckland| Events in Auckland-New Zealand
Agenda 08:45 – 09:00Registration 09:00  – 09:10Conference Summary 09:10  – 09:50Innovations in Blockchain and FintechSpeaker – Chris Linton, Consultant, Duncan Cotterill Bio –  Chris is a corporate/commercial and tech. law specialist, who is actively involved in the bitcoin [BTC], fintech and crypto space. She’s on the Committee of  Blockchain NZ, a member of Fintech NZ, and on the Fintech regulatory roundtable (focussing on the legal and regulatory implications of crypto and ICOs/TGEs).  She frequently speaks on law and regulation, and has excellent working relationships with the regulators. Chris acts for a growing number of bitcoin [BTC], fintech and crypto clients, in New Zealand and offshore. As a lawyer who’s worked in the technology (and corporate) space for many years, she finds the transformative potential of fintech, bitcoin [BTC] and crypto  hugely exciting. 09:50  – 10:30The Splendors and Miseries of Security Token Offerings Speaker – Donn Krassiyenko, Investment Research Manager, Blockchain & ICO at Techemy Capital Topic Abstract – “The Digital Revolution has brought us to a threshold of a whole new world called “the Internet of Value”. Enabled by bitcoin [BTC], it allows both businesses and individuals to digitally capture, democratise, securely transfer, and rightfully own the value they possess, whether it is personal data, real estate, company shares, fine art, gold, or goodwill. For one, bitcoin [BTC] allows start-ups to get easier access to capital. By tokenising business value and opting for ICO crowd-funding models, companies have raised nearly US$30 billion in funds in 2018. This presentation will take you through the latest bitcoin [BTC] investment trends, shed the light on winning practices, and navigate you through turmoil ahead of the rise of security token offering (STOs)”  Bio – “Coming from a marketing and ICT background, Donn has first-hand experience working with disruptive technologies such as cybersecurity, cloud, mobility, AI, and IoT. As a FinTech strategist, Donn is placed on the forefront of digital transformation, using his analytical skills and industry knowledge to help businesses to navigate through the impenetrable mists of bitcoin [BTC] landscape, and make strategy and investment decisions. By bridging the legacy world with the realities of the Internet of Value, Donn makes it easier for businesses to embrace the technological change and stay relevant by renovating business models. Working for the Techemy group, Donn acts as a trusted and expert advisor to corporate leadership and is responsible for driving high impact strategic and business development initiatives. Donn oversees investment prioritisation, business mix assessment, as well as private equity and M&A strategies. He is challenged with deploying Techemy’s capital into digital cryptographic assets, investing in early-stage ICO start-ups across bitcoin [BTC] infrastructure and crypto protocols.” 10:30 – 10:50Networking and Refreshment Break 10:50 – 11:00Easy Crypto presents “Constructive disruption” Speaker – MCed by Janine Grainger, Founder of Easy Crypto Topic Abstract – This session will explore the ways in which bitcoin [BTC] and fintech enterprises are helping improve the world we live in. Featured speakers in this session are: Leeanna Kohn-Hardy, Ossie Amir and Emily Fry  Bio –  Janine is a strategist with a background that spans banking, finance, government and technology. She founded Easy Crypto in late 2017 with her brother Alan, with the mission to make cryptocurrencies easily accessible to everyday New Zealanders. Janine is a firm believer in the potential of bitcoin [BTC] and distributed ledger technologies to transform the way our world connects and transacts, once the internal and external constraints are overcome. 11:00  – 11:30The State of Cash in a FinTech WorldSpeaker – Ossie Amir, Co-Founder and Blockchain Lead, ChoiceTopic Abstract – Choice is a new contactless payments platform, connecting banking APIs with New Zealand’s physical terminal fleet, letting users pay with their phone by scanning a ChoiceQR code on a terminal. Choice is a net positive payments ecosystem, reducing transaction fees for merchants, and taking 50% of that reduced fee to donate to a New Zealand charity of the consumer’s choice. The impact generated through the ecosystem is tracked through bitcoin [BTC], and the infrastructure is open making it globally scalable, while allowing anyone to participate in creating an equitable domestic payments system for Aotearoa. Bio – Ossie has founded organisations which span across artificial intelligence, renewable nanocarbon technology, industrial hemp cultivation, and third-world labour equality, on his mission to inspire and empower people across the world to live without fear. He is now taking on the inequalities of the payments industry with Choice. 11:30 – 12:00The world of socially responsible cryptocurrenciesSpeaker – Leeanna Kohn-Hardy, Founder at finappsterTopic Abstract – Take a deep dive into the new wave of socially responsible cryptocurrencies. Bio – A wealth of experience in digital marketing and finance and passion for sustainability has contributed to Leeanna founding “finappster”, which gives retail investors more transparency around the environmental, social and governing impact of their cryptocurrencies. 12:00 – 12:30Self Sovereign IdentitySpeaker: Emily Fry, CX & UX | Strategy | Digital IdentityTopic abstract – Emily will discuss advancements in digital identity in the New Zealand context. Spark recently announced that it has joined as a Founding Steward of the Sovrin Network, which hopes to construct the first truly self-sovereign identity (SSI) network. This will enable individuals to have true control and visibility over their data and privacy. Bio: Emily is part of Spark’s new business entity which is focusing on long-term, large-scale new business opportunities from a range of emerging technologies. Emily’s particular focus is the rapidly evolving space of self-sovereign identity. 12:30 – 13:30Lunch Break 13:30 – 14:30Panel Discussion – FinTech – A Friend or Foe? Speaker: Sean Bennett, Stronghold Co-founder and CTO Bio: Stronghold CTO Sean Bennett co-founded Stellar’s very first anchor, Coinex, in 2014. In early 2015 he and his team partnered with Stellar for their first fundraising auction, raising more than $1.5 million to fund ongoing Stellar operations.A native of New Zealand, Sean heads Stronghold’s office in Christchurch where he manages the company’s development team. Alongside Sean’s primary role at Stronghold, he holds advisory positions across multiple industries including financial services and aged care wherehe focuses on: 1) emerging technologies such as bitcoin [BTC], smart contracts and machine learning, 2) business and systems analysis; readiness for scale, 3) solution architecture, API strategy, and product execution, and 4) startups and business models.   14:30 – 15:10Regulatory requirements for business considering Cryptocurrency & BlockchainSpeaker – Bryan Ventura, Associate at Anderson Creagh Lai Limited Bio – ‘Commercial lawyer at Anderson Creagh Lai, with a passion for and professional background in, bitcoin [BTC] technology, as an advisor and transaction lawyer. Other experiences include corporate and securities law, financial regulation and entrepreneurship (in my personal capacity).’ 15:10 – 15:30Networking & Refreshment break 15:30 – 16:10Impact of Blockchain on Digital MarketingSpeaker – Andrey Arestov, Digital Marketing Delivery Manager at AMP Bio – Digital marketing expert with more than 15 years of multinational experience across financial, manufacturing, automotive and chemical industries. 16:10 – 16:50Emergence of Blockchain IoTSpeaker: Chayse Gorton, IDC – Market Analyst, IT Services and Blockchain Topic abstract : IoT investment is forecasted to bring NZD$2.2 billion of benefit to the New Zealand economy over the next ten years, some of which will be directly linked to bitcoin [BTC] technologies. The value of IoT is related to not only the amount of data being captured but also the quality of that data being captured across a vast range of connected devices. Stakeholders use the data to make informed decisions about actions to take, or in some cases, these are done automatically. Therefore, there is a concern about the potential security issues with this data as it moves from sensor to sensor. This is where bitcoin [BTC] comes in as it provides a means to ensure that the data is trustworthy. In addition, bitcoin [BTC] creates efficiencies in the form of increasing the speed of processing data, reducing the need for expensive centralised IT structures and enabling stakeholders to set up contracts without third parties. Bio : Chayse Gorton is a market analyst at IDC; IDC is the premier global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications and consumer technology markets. Chayse is responsible for the primary analysis and report writing on research produced within the regional research group. Chayse has expertise in a range of areas including security, cloud, mobility, managed services, bitcoin [BTC], and leads the New Zealand Heatmap series that provides strategic analysis on these topics. Chayse has a strong interest in distributed ledger technology, is a Certified bitcoin [BTC] Professional, and is a member of the bitcoin [BTC] association of New Zealand. 17:10 – 17:30Closing ceremony with note of Thanks & Felicitation
starting on 2019-02-08 09:00:00

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Bitcoin Gold Is About to Trial an ASIC-Resistant Bitcoin Fork

Bitcoin Gold Is About to Trial an ASIC-Resistant Bitcoin Fork

It’s forking season.

After bitcoin Cash (Bcash) forked from the bitcoin blockchain to create a new cryptocurrency (BCH), and ahead of the SegWit2X fork that may do the same thing, a third bitcoin fork is in the making: bitcoin Gold (Bgold; BTG). But where Bcash and SegWit2X are scaling-related forks — both mainly increase bitcoin’s block size limit — Bgold wants to re-decentralize mining by implementing a new proof-of-work algorithm.

“What was born as decentralized is now centralized,” bitcoin Gold contributor J. Alejandro Regojo told bitcoin Magazine, referring to the current state of bitcoin mining. “With this fork, we want to show how bitcoin can be as ‘Satoshi’ as possible, as social as possible, and as decentralized as possible.”

Mining Centralization

bitcoin Gold was initiated by Jack Liao, CEO of Hong Kong–based mining hardware producer LightningASIC, and was first announced in late August. The open project has been gaining traction and support in the wider cryptocurrency space since, with a dedicated Slack as a main hub for discussion and organization. Bgold is currently being developed by the pseudonymous developer “h4x3rotab” along with a small group of volunteers contributing to the project in other ways.

The attention Bgold has attracted is probably in part because anyone who owns bitcoin (BTC) on October 25th will receive the equivalent amount of BTG. While this model has been criticized, particularly because it presents a burden on service providers and users, it has also proven successful. With the launch of bitcoin Cash in particular, users eagerly accepted their batch of “free money,” while exchanges, wallets and other service providers proved relatively willing to integrate the new coin.

Further, the Bgold team believes that this distribution method should also benefit bitcoin over altcoins as it provides an extra incentive to hold BTC on particular dates.

“But the key goal that we are trying to achieve with this fork is to build a perpetually ASIC-resistant version of bitcoin,” said Robert Kuhne, another bitcoin Gold contributor, in explaining the purpose of the project to bitcoin Magazine.

Bgold contributors like Regojo and Kuhne think that bitcoin’s proof-of-work hashing algorithm was essentially broken by the introduction of specialized ASIC (application-specific integrated circuit) mining hardware. In the early years of bitcoin’s existence, individual users were often also miners; this has since become concentrated into relatively centralized data centers operated by professionals.

“And we’re now in a situation where 65 percent of hash power comes from a country that doesn’t like bitcoin,” Regojo noted, referring to China’s recent clamp down on cryptocurrencies.

An Uneven Playing Field

And while mining is centralized, ASIC production is even more centralized, the Bgold contributors pointed out. Only a handful of companies currently produce such specialized chips.

This means that anyone who wants to be a miner in any meaningful way is beholden to these companies, Kuhne argued.

“The way the monopoly manufacturer currently operates is abusive to its customers — individual miners — and the industry at large,” he said, referring to major Chinese ASIC producer Bitmain. “Manufacturers can produce ASICs at a tiny cost, but miners have to buy at a high price. This violates the one-CPU-one-vote ethos as described in the bitcoin white paper, because while everyone can buy CPU at the same price, the same is not true for ASIC hardware.”

Regojo and Kuhne see this as a fundamental problem — not something that free market dynamics can realistically resolve. They suggest that the barrier of entry to the ASIC market to compete with existing manufacturers is fundamentally too high to allow for open competition.

“You can’t build a factory without approval from the government and banking system. So there are really only a handful of entities in the world that have total authority over who can and can’t manufacture ASIC machines. And all this could potentially get much worse if and when those institution really start feeling the disruption from bitcoin, which hasn’t begun in earnest yet,” Kuhne said.

bitcoin Gold

As opposed to the bitcoin Cash and (especially) the upcoming SegWit2X forks, bitcoin Gold very specifically does not make a claim to be the “real” bitcoin. Instead, the Bgold project hopes it can prove a valuable exercise for bitcoin; a sort of test case for a hard fork that bitcoin itself may one day require.

Concretely, bitcoin Gold is now implementing the Equihash proof-of-work algorithm. This is already used by Zcash and is relatively ASIC-resistant.

Full ASIC-resistance, however, is thought to be impossible: Any mining algorithm could be subject to specialized chips. Like Vertcoin, the Bgold community therefore plans to re-deploy a new proof-of-work algorithm hard fork if it is found out that ASIC-chips for Equihash are being produced. (This plan alone, of course, could be a deterrent for any potential ASIC-producer.)

For security, the project plans to implement strong replay protection to avoid loss of funds for unsuspecting or non-technical users. It will also adopt a new difficulty re-target algorithm to prevent the blockchain from stalling: Difficulty is re-adjusted at every block instead of once every two weeks.

While the coin is set to launch two weeks from now, the Bgold codebase is not yet fully developed and ready to be deployed. Implementation of the new proof-of-work algorithm and replay protection, as well as the new difficulty re-adjustment scheme, are yet to be finished.

Nor are all the details for the project even ironed out.

Early announcements indicated that bitcoin Gold would have a closed launch and a presale of coins. A new batch of BTG was to be mined in the first week after the fork and subsequently distributed to designated investors, not unlike an ICO. Proceeds of this “ICO” were then to be used for development and other Bgold-related purposes.

However, as interest in the project grew, this idea became more controversial. Not everyone involved with bitcoin Gold likes the idea of an additional founders reward — something Bcash, for example, did not have.

Kuhne addressed the issue by stating: “We have heard a lot of feedback from the community, so this proposal will be replaced with an updated and improved plan. But we will not completely rule out the possibility of a modest pre-mine to provide a basic level of funding for the project.”

Disclaimer: The author of this article holds BTC and will therefore also own BTG at launch.


The post Bitcoin Gold Is About to Trial an ASIC-Resistant Bitcoin Fork appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

What does it take to mine 1 ethereum a day?

What Does It Take To Mine 1 Ethereum a Day?

What Does It Take To Mine 1 Ethereum a Day? Today i show you what it would take to mine 1 Ethereum a day at the end of 2018. If you compare this to almost […]

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